Fan movie of awesome

Today, I don't have much to write... right now.  But I definitely do think you will appreciate this fan movie, titled Portal: No Escape.

Possible awesome zombie movie

I didn't find out until last night that they're making a World War Z movie.  

THAT'S RIGHT!  A movie about one of the most realistic fictionalizations of a zombie apocalypse.  Part of the reason I like it so much is that it is so thoughtful about what would happen on a global scale.  And now they're doing a movie about it.

Some of you would be like Mystic and somewhat skeptical about how they will redo the movie, knowing that they'll have to cut out something.  But I do have some hope.  The movie is still keeping the interview style of the book, as Brad Pitt as the UN appointed author that conducts the interviews.  There will be flashback.  Sure, they're not going to use every interview in the book to tell the story, but there are definitely going to be some awesome moments.

Set to open December 21st, 2012.  One of the few movies I'm definitely doing a midnight showing.  Who's with me?

A Plea to Watch the Original Akira

I feel so out of the loop, because I only found out today through an article on Cracked.com that they're going to try to do a live movie of Akira.  For those of you not in the know, Akira is a brilliant anime film based on a manga series of the same name.  And I do mean brilliant.  It's a story that focuses on the corruption of power and the painful metamorphoses of adolescence through a plot focused on secret government testing and psychic powers.  As many years as it has been since I last saw it, I still remember it being a great film.  It was also one of America's first taste of what anime had to bring as a medium, and thank god because it's a brilliant piece of work.

So now, before any of you see the live version, I URGE YOU to watch Akira as soon as possible.  Now.  Before it's ruined for you.  Before you can only think of it as the movie release that's slated in 2013.

Because the brilliance of this movie will not be repeated in a live action film.

The cracked article I link to above makes some valid points that I don't want to repeat here.  My point is that you can tell with the way that the producers are going about this adaptation, the substance of the original piece is going to be lost.  Casting is a little more focused on who's popular right now, even if some of the actors mentioned could definitely do the parts justice.  But also, they're going to strip away the setting and essentially the background that made the story and characters powerful.  I'm not saying you can't talk about the themes presented in a post-nuclear future Japan in a story set in the United States, but you definitely can't talk about them in the same way.  Japan has a history that is plagued with natural disasters and large-scale attacks in a tiny amount of space, on an island of people who (mostly) share similar ancestry.  America is an expansive country full of diversity that was necessary to make it survive, with different geographical cultures that only recently have consistently started to interact with each other  and the country hasn't had to fight any war on it's soil on a large scale in over a century.  Unless you count vague propaganda wars on Terror and Drugs.  You cannot get the same story.

This is where I think a lot of producers fail to adapt their products correctly when it comes to acquiring foreign properties.  You lose a lot when you flip the setting so unceremoniously.  As much as you may feel you can just change the background and have the story be the same, it's very rarely true.  Shakespeare was able to produce stories that can do that... not many other writers have.  And it's not a failing on the writers part.  Some stories can only be told from a certain place.

This is one of those times where it would possibly make more sense to be inspired from the original work but then admit you are doing your own story. Inspiration sometimes works best.  I think I would be lesss frustrated if that was what's going on.  But I think they're hoping to slap the name Akira on the movie in hopes of getting nerd sales on top of the regular sales because it's been working for the comic book industry.  Hence why I am extremely suspicious.

Regardless of even if this live action movie exists later on, watch Akira.  You shouldn't need an excuse to watch a great piece of film.

God of War Indie Movie

A friend of mine posted this video on facebook, and I decided to share it with you guys because it's pretty hilarious and intriguing at the same time.



I personally like it because it's actually an intriguing idea. But it's also funny, because of all the video games to make into an indie movie, that is not the first one to come to mine. You're more likely to think of something like Braid.

Battleship movie?!

Everyone remembers the board game Battleship, right?  You guess where your opponent has placed their ships in hopes of sinking their entire fleet.  A description can be found here, though it focuses more on the pen and paper version.  Most people know the the Milton Bradley board game version pictured below.

So now they're going to make a movie based on this.  Part of me thinks this is a horrible idea.  Why?  Well, according to this article, the whole movie is going to be in space.  So instead of flying around shooting each other, we get boring bomb launches in outer space.  Space is three dimensional fighting!  It's not meant to have stagnent ships!  

Also, Rihanna is starring in it.  Nothing against Rihanna... but I hope her acting is better than her singing.  You think she sings well?  Have you heard her without autotune?  No?  No one has.  Anyway, there are some other nerdy stars there, but this project... this sounds like a cheese fest waiting to happen.  And unlike Snakes on a Plane, there's isn't an actor on the project smart enough to make the cheese factor work for them.

Once again Hollywood will ruin a small part of my childhood.

Though to be honest I will probably be dragged into watching the movie with some friends anyway.  That's how I got dragged into every other movie I had serious doubts about.

Inception... is it sci-fi?

I got to see Inception today, which was totally worth it!  I rarely think it's worth the time to go see a movie in theaters, just because the silver screen can be rather expensive.  However, this is a movie that you need to see with friends so afterwards you can look at each other and say "What the hell did I just see?"

Part of the reason I'm writing about it now is because at the beginning of the movie I started to wonder... is this a science fiction movie "disguised" as a cerebral drama?  I use the quotes because most sci-fi concepts are cerebral.  But the sci-fi part of this movie were not emphasized.

The main plot is that Cobb, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, is a man extremely good at extracting information from people through dreams. He finally gets a job that could allow him to go back to his family (he's accused of a crime and constantly on the run) and makes a team to do something that many think impossible: Inception.  They're given the task of planting an idea through a dream.  Only one person claims to have done it before, which is our hero Cobb.   Everyone else knows it's risky, and it will take a lot more delving into the mind than any of them have done.  Using a bunch of "science", they figure out a way to plant an idea that is crucial to preventing a global company becoming an international energy monopoly.  Everyone is used to getting ideas, but can they give one that is convincing?

What makes this movie a sci-fi?  Or any movie for that matter?  Well, it tends to show an image of a future, close or distant, with a technology that people find somewhat believable, and using that to explore an idea about humanity.  And I would like to argue that Inception almost does that.

Image of the Future:  It could be now, but everyone who watches the movie knows that the technology to infiltrate dreams, which seems more like a skill than a technology, is not something that exists right now.  The way it's presented, this isn't an alternate universe.  This is either now or in the near future.  It's future enough.

Believable Technology: This is where it starts to get tricky.  Sharing dreams with other people hasn't been a technology proven yet.  Using an IV in your arm to share a dream with up to 5 people where everyone is aware and somewhat in control... that's where realistically I can't 100% buy in.  Now you may think I'm hyper critical here, that space ships really can't be in space like they are in the movies and aliens aren't realistic either.  And you're partially right.  But this is something that is partially true.  We've done space travel, and there are planets that could possibly have life.  Robots do exist.  I know of nothing that recently investigates a shared dream state.  You readers are definitely allowed to prove me wrong.

Idea about Humanity:  This is definitely true.  Regret and baggage, along with the idea of inception itself.  It can't really be an outside force, it does have to come from within, which is why the dream diving is so necessary.  Great ideas.  Maybe not shown in the whole scope that many sci-fi's do, but after reading Lathe of Heaven I can see how these ideas can be applied to a small cast of characters.

Inception is almost pure sci-fi.  My particulars for my personal taste make it not, but if someone called it sci-fi, I wouldn't be as offended as I am when people call Star Wars sci-fi.  But that's another blog post for another day.

Classic Hilarity on Hulu

I'm watching things online maybe a little too much.  But when you put on amazing things, how could I not?

One recent addition I grew up with is Mystery Science Theater 3000.  There's only a few episodes on but they're fantastic.  If you like making fun of horrible, old sci fi and horror movies, you should check it out.

Check it out now!  Right here!

Need an idea of what you're in for?  This episode is a pretty good one to start with.

Why are the smurfs in 3D?

Okay, watch this video.

Why are the smurfs in CG?  This looks awful!

There are certain concepts that look better in 2D.  I still like regular cartoons.  They're still good looking. Sometimes you soil them if you try the style in CG.  The smurfs are such a case.

Another movie about blue people with different ways that's sure to disappoint me?  Nah, this time I think I'm going to skip it.

Disappointed with Avatar.

I hate to start out this blog post with this title, but that is how I feel after just coming back from seeing Avatar in 3D.  I may rant on for ages about this, but I don't want to.  Because I did want to like this movie.

I'm all for something original being told.  I know that only so many stories can be told, after a certain point, most stories are the same.  That's fine.  As a writer I know that and battle with this inevitability.  You can't always blatantly say something's not original enough.  But for me, it was that there were not enough original things.

To hopefully move along my banter in a smooth way, I'm going to divide this post into the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.  Like that hasn't be done before.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

The Good

You can not knock how beautiful this movie is.  You can not deny that every damn detail on the silver screen was captivating the audience.  Even if I didn't see it in 3D, I would've appreciated everything I saw.  It was awesome.  And I loved looking at it.

The CGI acting at some points was better than the real acting.  Facial expressions and subtle movements were great.  I might just have noticed it because of all my theatre experience, but it was great to see CGI finally capture that so perfectly.  Not at every moment, but a good number of them.  For once, it didn't feel like I was watching a fancy cartoon.

The pacing of the story, although predictable, was good.

The one thing that I thought was surprisingly thoughtful was the idea that the plant life and animals were on a neural network that connected the entire plant.  It was a very empathic network, and allowed the native flora and fauna to communicate with each other.  It was easy to see why the Na'vi respected the land they lived on.  They had literally felt it.

The Bad

Yes, it was Dances with Wolves with aliens.  Yeah, it is the white hero fantasy.  I'm a jaded educated minority who has realized it's going to take a long time for people to stop caring about that story.  Luckily I don't feel I'm a minority in my opinion here.  History will run its guilt-ridden course. This issue doesn't irk me much.

It was a fantasy movie trying not to be a fantasy movie.  For me, sci-fi is about humanity's complex questions and ethical choices that possibly have no precedent.  Star Trek does that really well, so do great writers like William Gibson and Isaac Asimov.  And it's not to say that sci-fi must be trying to answer a question, but it tends to.  Fantasy tends to be about epic adventures, destiny, fantastic heroics that are necessary to save the world.  Avatar is a fantasy movie in that sense.  Sure, there were no elves, but there were goddamn archers and old gods that lived in trees.

The animal life on that plant, to my standards, were ridiculous unoriginal.  This is how it went: "Let's make a horse, but give it SIX LEGS!  Or how about a pteradatctyl with FOUR WINGS!  What about a GLOWING weeping  willow?  Shit, aren't we creative!"  No, you fucking aren't, nor ever were you actually creative.  You decided to take something that actually exists in the real world and give it a new paint job.  Congratulations, you paint well.

The Ugly

As I mentioned before, I can get over the "racist" tones of the white hero story.  To a lot of people, and to many of them subconsciously, becoming white is the way to redemption.  That's our culture.  I live with it every day.  It's easy to ignore it.

My problem is when every single damn tribal culture needs to have braids, feathers, and beads, or else you can't understand that the culture is a "live on the land" type of culture.  Seriously, guys?  You invent a whole new planet with a whole new slew of natural resources, and you've decided to base the Na'vi costuming on things you grew up reading about in National Geographic?  We can't have tribes who, I don't know, actually have clothing made from the animals in their damn ecosystem?  That's right, the Na'vi feathers don't appear on any animal in their ecosystem.  I don't know what they made their beads from, but I didn't see anything that could become clay in that movie.

I might be a bit sensitive about that particular lack of creativity, but it's because I'm tired of every tribe having the same traits.  Even if you look around the world you will see there are groups of nomadic or nature-bound people who have *gasp* ACTUAL CLOTHES with NO FEATHERS OR BEADS!  Sometimes they make tapestries or sew together animal skins that don't look like leopard print.  It just points out to me that the designers of this project went out of their way to make the Na'vi look "ethnic" rather than "alien".  I know I can be sensitive to things that elude to racial stereotypes, but that was definitely what first struck me when I saw the Na'vi in their hometree.

Speaking of which, WHY IS THERE ALWAYS A DAMN TREE?  Why can't it be a peat moss or a brain coral, why always a tree?  Again, super uncreative.

Finally, I hear the Cameron is trying to mold Avatar into the same kind of hit franchise that Star Wars and Star Trek is.  In the sense of getting it so big people will have Avatar conventions.  You shitting me?  Nothing in this movie touched me enough that I have to go and talk to other people about how much I love the Na'vi way of life.  I'm going back to the petrol-using urban ways right after this.  Star Trek showed an idealistic universe where unifying different minds was a goal, not an impossibility.  Star Wars tells an epic story of a young man who finds a strength he never thought he had, and how he must save an entire universe from his own father.  Avatar doesn't approach the same kind of connection that either of these franchises did when they started.  People wrote in to change the name of a space-faring ship from NASA to Enterprise.  No one is going to care about Avatar that much.  It's not original enough, expansive enough, or captivating enough to do what Star Wars and Star Trek did without trying in the first place.

As much as I am complaining, I don't think Avatar is a bad movie.  The story is well told, and it is beautiful.  But don't expect it to change the movie industry.  Don't expect a whole bunch of Avatar geeks to be talking about as much as Twilight fans debate Edward versus Jason.  Just expect people to enjoy it and then move on.  It just isn't that special.

Wait, they're making what a movie?

They're going to make Neuromancer into a movie?  And I didn't know?!?!?!

I LOVE that book and I didn't even finish it.  High school homework and activities got in the way of leisurely reading.  But the Gibson is a fantastic writer and I think everyone should read something of his, especially considering he is the father of the cyber punk genre.  That's right, without Gibson, there would be no Tron!  Or anything close to the awesome hacker stories... that don't happen enough.

The movie doesn't come out until 2011, and for once I will go out of my way to read the book to see if the movie is a good translation.  I just love Neuromancer that much.

Also, clicking that link shows off some great artwork for the movies.